


she is the tear that hangs inside my soul forever

by midnightsvn



Category: Twilight (Movies), Twilight Series - All Media Types, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Edward's POV, F/M, Heavy Angst, i guess writing sad shit is a coping mechanism?, idk man
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-16
Updated: 2020-05-16
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:34:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24216742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnightsvn/pseuds/midnightsvn
Summary: Edward's plan to let Bella live her human life without him goes accordingly, and fifteen years later, he thinks she has moved on. Until a book written by Bella herself brings her and their memories flooding back to him.A New Moon AU where Edward never thinks Bella is dead and he never comes back to Forks.
Relationships: Edward Cullen/Bella Swan
Comments: 12
Kudos: 60





	she is the tear that hangs inside my soul forever

**Author's Note:**

> This is a New Moon AU that came about after I imagined what would have happened if Edward never thought Bella was dead, and she would've carried on living her human life. Bella gets a bad rap for being the self-sacrificial one, but I think Edward's decision to leave is still the ultimate sacrifice. He's dumb but he really did think Bella was better off without him, and he sacrificed his own happiness to give Bella hers. :(
> 
> Thank you to my friends Kelly, Dina, Christy, Sarah, and Mafi for pre-reading this and giving me comments even though it made them sad.
> 
> Title comes from the unmatched, brilliant, ultra-sad song _Lover, You Should've Come Over_ by Jeff Buckley.

For the millionth time in my long life, I wished for the ability to sleep. A state of rest, even for a few, fleeting hours, would be a welcome reprieve from the confines of my own mind and the exile I’d subjected myself to. 

The sun was just beginning to rise now, and I could see the first hints of sunlight warring with heavy clouds through the tiny, solitary window in the studio apartment I lived in, only an approximation of a home. The space was small, with the barest furnishings of a couch, a coffee table, and a tall bookcase in one corner. I had no need for a bed, and no humans ever entered here to warrant the charade. Against one wall was an upright piano, sent here by Carlisle and Esme, but I played only to give my hands something to do, rote and emotionless. The music had left my heart long ago.

On the coffee table, the smartphone I used to keep in contact with my family started vibrating, alerting me to a call. 

Rosalie, the name on the little screen read. I debated ignoring it for now; usually Rose’s calls to me were a result of her own boredom, as if anything in my empty life could ever interest her. The decision I’d made to live away from our family had done wonders for my relationship with my icy sister. In our case, the old proverb _absence makes the heart grow fonder_ certainly applied. 

I’d tried for a while to continue living with them, to pretend to be human and normal, but if it had been hard to be around six mated vampires before I knew Bella, it became simply unbearable after losing her. Even worse than my own agony was their guilt that I had to watch their joy while I suffered alone. They were still the same family I loved, but no longer did I belong in that life. I visited them from time to time, though, when Rose and Emmett would have one of their weddings or if they needed me to read any suspicious minds, just to err on the side of caution.

My finger hovered over the end button. I could call her back later and apologize for the snub, when I was in a better mood. But she hadn’t called in a few weeks, and the family might have some sort of emergency.

I sighed and accepted the call. “Hello, Rose.”

“Hello, Edward,” she answered, surprisingly curt, considering she was the one initiating this conversation. “There’s… a situation.”

I tensed, but waited for her to continue. I could almost hear her mind turning as she grasped for the right words.

“I’ve sent it to you in a package already, so you’ll get it soon… She wrote a _book_ about you, Edward,” Rosalie said in a rush, the way one did when one delivered bad news.

A book? It was far from whatever I had thought to expect. It made no sense that Esme or Alice would write a book about me, of all things. And if they had done so, surely they would have asked, or at least informed me first. If it was Alice, though, I was not surprised that this was the first I was hearing of it. Whatever improvements Rose and I had achieved in our relationship, it had been the opposite for my other sister. Alice was still angry with me for how things had ended in Forks, upset that she hadn’t been able to say goodbye to Bella. _I loved her, too, you know,_ she reminded me again and again. Once, I asked her if it made it better that I would never forgive myself, either, but that only served to make her angrier. I did not relish the hurt I caused my sister, but she could hold a grudge against me for eternity if that was what it took to keep Bella safe.

I lifted a hand to my temple, as if to soothe a headache, and told Rosalie, “Why is this a problem, Rose? Alice can’t be thinking of publishing it, can she? Is she out of her m—”

“No, you dunce,” she hissed. “ _Bella_ wrote the book. Bella Swan.”

If my heart were alive, it would have stopped beating. I tried to think of something, anything to say, but I was dumbstruck.

I heard Rose sigh, and her voice was softer now as she told me, “It will probably arrive today. Call me after you’ve read the book,” then she hung up.

The thoughts in my mind ran a thousand miles an hour as I contemplated the book, and what the implications of it were. Rosalie had said it was about _me_ specifically. Did that mean Bella had not forgotten me, had not moved on like I’d been sure she would? Surely after fifteen years, I was no more than a mere fading memory to her.

Fifteen years.

It had been fifteen years since Forks, since those few short months that I’d spent with Bella gave me more happiness than any I had known in the ninety years I’d lived prior, and more than I would ever know again for the rest of my existence. The years had worn on without my notice, yet the mark of that love was as indelible as it had always been. 

I was anxious to read the book, and luckily, Rose’s estimation had been right; it was delivered at my doorstep later that same day. After tearing through the cardboard box, in my hands I held a book called _Twilight_ , and from the well of my own memories, knew exactly what conversation it was referencing. Across the front, emblazoned in simple font, was the author’s name: Bella Swan. I didn’t pause to think whether that meant she was unmarried, or if she’d preferred to publish under her maiden name.

I inhaled a deep, unnecessary breath as I gently flipped the book open, landing on the dedication page.

_To a first, true love,  
Lost but unforgotten._

The pain that lanced through me at reading that short sentence was greater than any emotion I had felt in the last fifteen years.

And it did not get much better the deeper I dived into the pages of the book. Though the names and the setting—it was set in a fictional town, rather than in Forks—had been changed, reading it made me feel as though I’d stumbled into a time machine, transported back to the only sunny days in the midnight that was my life. Every look we had shared, every word we had spoken, every feeling I was unaware she’d returned, they were all contained here, giving me a unique glance into the silent mind I had been so desperate to understand. Cracks bloomed in my chest at each perfect memory I was able to relive through Bella’s own words.

Too soon, I finished the story. I resisted the urge to immediately read the book a second time; I knew I had to call Rose now, to put at ease any worries the family might have had about exposure, if they thought they needed to bring this to my attention. I dialed the number, and my sister picked up almost immediately.

“How are you feeling?” she asked in greeting.

Like I’d been hit by fifteen freight trucks in a row. “I’m fine… Listen, I read the book, Rose, and I don’t think it should be an issue. The word _vampire_ is never even mentioned.” Bella had modified the lore to fit more traditional ideas of undead creatures, even combining some of it with zombies. It would take a special kind of crazy conspiracy theorist to connect this to our family. “I’m sorry if this has Carlisle or Esme worried—”

Rose cut me off. “That is not what they’re concerned about. Their only concern is you. You should come home, Edward. They miss you. We _all_ miss you.”

I scoffed. I doubted Alice wanted me around, and Jasper wouldn’t, either, because of how my presence would upset her. And I was sure Emmett and Rosalie only missed me because they had one less person to bully and play stupid pranks on. 

“My plan is still to visit next year, Rose. The whole town of Ashland should brace itself for my arrival,” I joked flatly. Next year was going to be Carlisle and Esme’s hundredth anniversary, and under no circumstances was I allowed to miss the celebration.

I heard her soft sigh. “Esme is looking forward to that. Are you sure you’re fine after reading Bella’s book?”

I nodded, even though she couldn’t see me. “Thank you, Rose.”

I let the words speak for themselves and ended the call.

Alone with my own thoughts again, I picked up the book to read it for the second time. Flipping to the very back, I saw a page I did not notice before. There was a black and white picture of a young woman, and shock clanged through me when I realized it was Bella.

She looked older than the eighteen-year-old girl trapped in my memories. She was thirty-two now, I marveled. Despite how she’d loathed aging, this girl—woman—looked every bit as beautiful to me as she always had.

Then, my heart was battered for the thousandth time that day as I read the short about the author note next to her photo. 

_ Bella Swan-Cooper loved books so much that she studied Literature for four years at Dartmouth College, and made a career out of trying to teach other young kids about books. Her writing heroines are Jane Austen and Emily Brontë. She currently resides in Phoenix, Arizona with her husband and their daughter. _ Twilight _is her first novel._

Of course she was married. Her life had been righted the moment I walked out of it; she had what every normal, human girl was supposed to have. She’d gone to college, built a career, found love… I should have been happy for her, but all I felt was rage and pain. And jealousy. I was so jealous and so outraged that her human husband had given her everything I never could have given her.

I wondered unabashedly if she loved him. How much could she, truly, if she had written about our time together and preserved those memories so perfectly… I allowed myself to imagine it again, what it would be like to betray all my promises and return to her. 

I would knock on her door, a ghost from another lifetime. And I would fall to my knees, to beg and grovel for her forgiveness. I imagined her beautiful smile, imagined the warmth of her soft arms wrapped around my stone chest. I imagined her scent burning my throat once again, that pain I had once so gladly endured. I imagined how peaceful she looked in slumber, her tranquil interrupted only by her own soft voice as she talked in her sleep. Would she still dream of me?

I squeezed my eyes shut and clenched my fist.

How foolish. How utterly conceited, to think she would receive me with anything other than hate or indifference if I ever came crawling back. How utterly selfish. 

The mantra I repeated whenever moments of weakness gripped me came back to the forefront of my mind: _I’d made a promise. Bella deserved a life. I’d made a promise. Bella deserved a life…_

And now she had it. I could never justify my interference now, because she was happy without me, the way she was always meant to be. The pain of the realization crushed my already broken husk of a heart.

Briefly, I considered an end to it, contemplated hastening my plan for oblivion now that I knew there was no chance Bella would ever love me again. Before I left, I could ask Alice to watch out for her, and make sure she was protected if there was ever any danger in her life. And if, by some cruel miracle, Carlisle was right… then I would accept my ticket to hell and burn forever.

But no, not yet. I didn’t have to yet. The knowledge that Bella was somewhere in the world, still drawing one breath after another, was reason enough to exist. It was enough to know she was alive and that her sweet laughter was heard, even if _I_ would never hear it again.

And I would not inflict that pain on Esme and Carlisle any sooner than I had to. Even as I reveled in my own misery, I knew what it would do to my parents once Bella was gone and I would have to follow her to whatever darker, more endless night was waiting in the next world. I planned on sparing my family from that pain for as long as possible.

In my mind’s eye, I saw Bella’s face again, kept safe in my flawless memory. Her deep brown eyes, the soft, rosy blush of her cheeks, and the long, dark brown tendrils of her hair. All these years, I had never stopped seeing her. I would never stop seeing her.

I closed my eyes and pretended to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
